One could argue that American corporations like Dell and Hewlett Packard will be abetting censorship if they acquiesce to China's recent demand that all personal computers sold in that country be equipped with software that allows government officials to block access to websites that disseminate "unhealthy information."
Some critics have presented the issue as a straightforward choice between corporate "profits" and enlightened "principle" (profit, predictably, being the immoral choice). Which is technically true. But what if profit is the constructive way to advance our principles?
The 40 million personal computers sold in China last year — many of them in the hands of once-isolated people — will do more to liberalize that nation than any government sanction or well-intentioned protest we could concoct. When, after all, has any policy of isolation or trade restriction helped spread democracy or undermine tyranny?
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